


A Lalonde By Any Other Name

by myasmatheory



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Dysfunctional Family, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-27
Updated: 2011-12-27
Packaged: 2017-10-28 06:18:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,301
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/304660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myasmatheory/pseuds/myasmatheory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"To say that Lalondes were terrible parents would not be entirely, wholly, untrue.</p><p>Rose knows this. Her mother knows it. In some far off universe, where Rose is her mother's mother and her mother is Rose's daughter, they both are still aware of this one, true fact."</p><p>Potential spoilers for EOA5 and Act 6!</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Lalonde By Any Other Name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [negligibleCatharsis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/negligibleCatharsis/gifts).



To say that Lalondes were terrible parents would not be entirely, wholly, untrue.

 

Rose knows this. Her mother knows it. In some far off universe, where Rose is her mother's mother and her mother is Rose's daughter, they both are still aware of this one, true fact.

 

 _('She hates me.')_

 

It's not true, by any stretch of the imagination, and you know that. You, yourself, know that both Rose and her mother are complex people wrapped up in their own little worlds with too much going on in their own minds to consider sharing it with anyone else. But you are not Rose, you are not the sly, witty young woman that would never back down from a challenge. You are not her mother, the woman who prepared Rose for a life-changing game in a series of gritty trials and tribulations no child should endure. You are only privy to the barest glimpses of what remains of their fractured, shattered relationship, much akin to a Rubix cube that's been twisted and twisted until you can't remember what it was supposed to look like originally.

 

 _(You never were as good at people as you were puzzles, but you enjoyed learning about both nonetheless.)_

 

So where does that leave you?

 

That leaves you with the ability to watch. To listen. Analyzing was supposed to be Rose's speciality, you know, she bows at the altar of Freud and worships at the shrine of Schultis; Rose is a master of everything from Pavlov to Jung, from Parker to Edwards, so talented at chipping away at words to reach their core meaning, but she remains deceptively unaware when others are doing the same to her.

 

 _(Or maybe she just doesn't expect it from you.)_

 

To be fair, you suppose that she wouldn't expect it from anyone other than Dave. The two of them are so alike, so content to play similar games of Twister with their words and thoughts, that they've always been able to reach right in and realize what the other is feeling without any complicated thought. You envy that, the easy ability to be able to crack and unfold the complications that are Rose Lalonde, and you wish you could do the same. 

 

You know that when Rose was young, her cat died, and her mother had a funeral and built an ornate tomb for the cat. Reflecting on it, you realize Rose is bitter about this fact, but this just cements the fact that something had already gone fundamentally wrong in their relationship. There was already a lack of communication, a wall of silence and neglect that festered into mistrust and bitter rejection. You know that much. You just don't know why.

 

It would be easy to blame paranoia about the game, you suppose. You aren't a psychologist; your specialty isn't knowing how people are supposed to react to stressful situations. Maybe, you think, you'd do the same thing in Rose's mother's place. If she didn't love you, you supposed, she wouldn't be sad once the game wiped you out of existence.

 

Fortunately or unfortunately, you're very much aware that that didn't work. Rose's mother couldn't walk that fine line that is loving someone too much and making them hate you without regrets. She wavered between locking herself away with drink and a cold shoulder, to showering Rose with ponies and giant wizard statues and genuine affection. 

 

You know that she tried. They both tried.

 

It just didn't work. Rose's mother couldn't keep herself steady, couldn't walk that fine line, and over time the two of them had slowly built a wall of regret for their actions and confused disappointment in each other.

 

Rose did okay, but you know the game hit her hard; harder than you could ever imagine. You see it in the slow, sad way she sometimes pauses at the book store, a mere few second break (pause, one-two-three, go) in her rhythm at the sight of the astrology and horoscope section. You see it when she often hesitates to buy sunglasses, letting her hands rest on the aviator shades that she regularly buys but never wears.

 

You know why, too. Rose has always had a knack for writing things down, from what you know, and you've always had a knack for getting into places you shouldn't. From the deepest, darkest corner of the library in her house, in the even darker hours of the night, you slowly unraveled Rose Lalonde.

 

You learn that she once knew a boy named Dave _('a warrior second to none, willing to stand long after everyone else has given in, with all the time in the world to be a stubborn, foulmouthed savior')_ , and she once died with him. You learn that she once knew a boy named John _('he was anywhere the wind blew and willing to go places it didn't, if we needed him, and this world will always need men like John')_ , and that she once died in front of him. You learn that she once knew a girl named Jade _('an Asterian Eos, one who once held the world in the palm of her hand, one I am loath to ever let the world forget')_ , and who she once could not save from dying.

 

It's here that you learn that Rose's mother wasn't that good of a mother. It stings, reading about years of built-up hostility that manifested in Rose's mother's death being such a blow that Rose is still furiously saddened about. The death is particularly painful for you to read, for reasons you don't fully understand: and, honestly, reasons don't truly want to ponder. Excusing it on the incredibly detailed and vivid language, almost like a far-away fairytale _('the herald of death, in all its twisted and brutish fury, came and struck down the foolishly naive king and the hazardously optimistic queen, leaving his heir and her seer in the heat of the battle, when they were needed the very most')_ you hurry through that section.

 

After you finish reading the most recent of her journals, dated the year you were born, you put them all back where they came from and lock the door behind you. You push it all to the back of your mind, where it stays and slowly tints everything you know about Rose. Months and months after that, you slowly break apart why Rose says and does things so much like her mother did.

 

When the world ends once again, you don't know where Rose is. You stand on a rooftop, watching it all fall, and you think. You think about Jade and John and Dave, and you wonder where they are now. You wonder if they ever really knew how deeply Rose loved them. 

 

You think about Rose's mom, and you wonder if maybe she loved Rose more than Rose ever knew. Maybe she knew what this 'herald of death' could do, knew that she would die, and risked it anyway.

 

 _('The kingdom had not fallen. The king fell; the queen fell; and while the heir lay in an immortal and immoral necrosis, the seer fell before death and injustice itself. While the heir rose, the seer rising soonafter, the king and queen never once stirred. They had fulfilled their purpose, and thus were no longer required to fight. They were finally, definitively, at peace, and in that the kingdom was the strongest it had ever been.')_

 

You think that doesn't sound so bad. It's stupid, it's ridiculously cheesy, but it was all she could do for Rose. In the end, that's what matters, and you hope _('I know')_ that's what matters to Rose.

 

Your name is R. Lalonde, and you wonder what you could do to have a daughter just like your mother.

 

(Maybe you'd make her happier this time.)

**Author's Note:**

> Asteria is the Greek goddess of the stars, and Eos is the 'supernaturally beautiful' Greek Titan that opened the gates of heaven.
> 
> All of the text in brackets and quotes was Rose; everything else was scratch!Mom Lalonde!


End file.
